


no strings to bind your hands

by lanyon



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-12
Updated: 2014-09-12
Packaged: 2018-02-17 03:16:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2294759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lanyon/pseuds/lanyon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For a long time, Clint Barton's been speaking a different language. Eventually, though, Phil gets it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	no strings to bind your hands

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sirona](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sirona/gifts).



> +title from _angel of the morning_  
>  +a very, very belated happy birthday to the wonderful **sirona** , who brightens my life considerably.

“You look beautiful in the morning, sir.”

“It’s not morning, Barton, and you’re concussed.”

“No, see, I think there’s empirical evidence— If you ask _anyone_ —”

“That’s _anecdotal evidence_ , Barton—”

“Yes, but— I dated a biochemist, sir. I _know_ these things.”

“Barton?”

“Yes, sir?”

“How about you let these nice medics do their work?”

“I bet they agree with me.”

(Coulson doesn’t stay to find out.)

.

The first time Phil Coulson sees Clint Barton, he barely notices him. Oh, he notices the scrawny kid with the bow and arrow, wearing a ridiculous costume outside the Big Top but he’s mostly focused on the goings-on in the Freak Show, announced with lopsided, lurid letters. 

Someone’s trying to make an actual hydra and where better to hide it? 

Phil can only hope his gun is big enough.

.

Clint is told he can’t see the body which, in the world of SHIELD, either means there isn’t one or else it’s really, really bad. He’s not sure which he expects it to be but it doesn’t stop him, or Natasha, from looking. 

It doesn’t stop him from being horrified when they uncover a file about experimental techniques that have never worked, or a suspicious document, signed by Phil Coulson. It looks like consent but Clint doesn’t believe it; he doesn’t believe that Coulson would want what is being described. 

He feels bad. He feels awful. He feels hopeful and that is what makes him feel worst of all: he wants Coulson to live, regardless of the price, if it has already been paid. 

.

Would you shoot a man to save yourself? Probably. 

Would you shoot a man to save many? Absolutely. 

Would you scrape a man back from a noble death because you thought, one time, that he looked beautiful in the morning? 

.

The first time Clint Barton sees Phil Coulson, he notices him. No one comes to the circus in a suit that nice, even if the lines of his jacket make it pretty damn clear that he’s a Fed packing heat. 

Heat. Heh.

.

 

“You look beautiful in the morning, sir.” 

“Barton, I can’t see out of my right eye. I’m reliably informed there’s a lump the size of an ostrich egg on my forehead and there are eighteen stitches in my lower lip.” 

“Yes, sir, and you look beautiful.”

“I thought you had good eyesight.”

“The best, sir. You’re alive. You need a new team.”

“They’re not that bad.” 

“Aside from the traitors.”

“Aside from them.”

.

Not being able to tell the Avengers about Coulson, even if it’s a cast-iron hunch, is more difficult than Clint could have imagined. Stark gets all thundery when the late Agent Coulson’s mentioned and Thor gets all sad and Steve gets all confused and Clint knows no way of saying, _hey, guys, I think he’s alive._

It’s hard until the day Tony raises a trembling finger to point at the TV screen. “Tell me that’s not the reanimated corpse of Phil Coulson.”

“It’s not the reanimated corpse of Phil Coulson,” says Clint, animated. 

“What do you know, Locksley?”

“Nothing,” says Clint, winking significantly.

“Do you have something in your eye?” asks Thor with concern. 

.

“It was going to happen eventually,” says Melinda. “Rumours of your death, et cetera—” 

“Sometimes it’s easier to build from ashes.”

.

“You look beautiful in the morning, sir.”

“It’s more than I can say for you, Barton. You need to shave. And shower.”

“You’re alive. You’re _alive_.”

“What _is_ that bandaid on your nose? Fashion accessory? Do you _snore_?”

“Wouldn’t you like to find out?”

.

It's like a fracture, slowly healing. There's pain but Phil Coulson knows pain. There's a lopsided circus smile and the insistence of worth. 

. 

Phil comes out of the tent, having lost a suit jacket, a gun, a tie, about a pint of blood and about a quarter of his dignity. He’s not entirely in the red, though; he has a sword and a few skin-or-scale scrapings from the attempted hydra and a stack of floppy disks with a lot of names. 

He puts on his sunglasses and catches sight of a kid with a black eye and a ridiculous costume. Spot the difference. 

“Show’s over, folks,” he says. The extraction point’s not far.

The second time he sees Clint Barton, he remembers. 

.

“You look so beautiful in the morning, sir.” The last syllable is drawn out and disappearing fast as Clint is flung through the air at great velocity. 

“What are they doing?” asks Steve.

“It’s some kind of dare,” says Phil. “I think. Though they’ll say they’re practising _manoeuvres_.”

Iron Man is throwing Clint through the air towards Falcon, who’s catching him and throwing him back. Captain Marvel and War Machine are doing something similar with Natasha. 

“Oh my god, I want a go,” says Bucky, plastered against Steve’s side, his eyes wide as he makes grabby hands in the general direction of the airborne acrobatics. 

“How’s SHIELD?” asks Steve, one hand absently scritching the back of Bucky’s neck. 

“Decimated. Quite literally. But we’re building up. We’re building right.”

“Good team?”

“Almost as good as yours, Captain,” says Phil. “I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you.” 

“Clint’s happy. He doesn’t have to keep it secret anymore.”

“He really is dreadful at keeping anything to himself,” says Phil.

“Yes,” says Steve.

“ _Yes_ ,” says Bucky, with more ferocity than can surely be merited. 

. 

“Stark gave you a floor,” says Clint. “A whole floor. That means he likes you.”

“Yes,” says Phil. “I’m aware that this is his version of leaving dead rodents at my door.”

“Different strokes,” says Clint. “If you know what I—”

“Yes,” says Phil. “Yes, I always know.”

His hands fumble, embarrassingly, but he's on his knees in front of Barton and it looks like Barton didn't see this coming. Nosing at the slightly sweaty crease at the top of Barton's thigh, Phil understands a little, though the words tumbling from Barton's lips are variants on his insistent theme. _Beautiful_. 

Beautiful like faith is beautiful, like someone else's crime is beautiful, like suffering is beautiful, like turbulence is beautiful, like Barton's cock in his mouth—

 

.

 

“Don’t you think it’ll be a conflict of interest, Director Coulson?” asks Stark. “You deal in secrets and I deal in intelligence.”

“I like to think we’re broadly on the same side,” says Phil. “Even if your brandname is more recognisable.” 

“He’s smiling a whole lot more,” says Stark. 

“Yes,” says Phil. “Yes.” 

“God, it’s like a spy slumber party round here,” says Stark, as though that’s not exactly how he likes it. “You know. You feed one stray—”

Clint is sprawled on a recliner on Stark’s rooftop. Phil can see the fingerprint bruises on his hips from here. Natasha’s draped nearby, like a cat in the sun, talking to Maria and Melinda. Phil’s filled with a sudden surge of warmth, like nothing he’s felt since long before the Bus and the Helicarrier. 

“You just have to know who you can trust,” says Phil. 

“I’ll let you know when I can trust SHIELD again,” says Stark. “No offence if I keep you guys close till then, right?” 

.

“You look— mmph.” 

(There are scars on Phil’s body; scars he can’t bear to look at or touch but when Barton gets that sleepy, sly look, Phil almost believes him.)


End file.
